Art Mengo

French singer-composer. Born in Toulouse from Spanish immigrants (both ardent Republicans who fled their country because of Franco's dictatorship), Michel Armengot suffered a 70% deafness during his childhood. Despite that, he early played a small electronic keyboard his mother gave him and as a teenager he regained perfect earing thanks to an operation and soon showed a big passion for music. After his 'baccalauréat' diploma, he studied physics and chemistry at university and played piano in a local bar in the evenings. He eventually dropped his studies and created a home studio in his bedroom. He wrote several compositions while his brother-in-law Patrice Guirao wrote lyrics around his melodies. In 1988, Michel brought a demo tape to the Polygone studio in Toulouse where he was signed for the single "Les Parfums de sa Vie". With his artist name Art Mengo (an anagram of his family name), he and his distinctive husky vocals had a big success with this song but because of a legal problem with his label he was not able to release his first album before early 1990. But when it was released, the album "Un 15 août en février" was a big hit in France (60,000 sold albums). Then he had another problem: his new single "Caïd Ali" was banned from French airwaves during the Gulf War. It didn't stop his success: he was voted Best New Male Artist of the Year at the 'Victoires de la Musique' Awards in 1991 and he recorded a new album ("Guère d'amour") in 1992. The same year he wrote the hit song "Ça ne change pas un homme" for French star Johnny Hallyday, and the following year he composed an entire album for German singer Ute Lemper with whom he also sang the duet "Parler d'amour". Quite a timid artist, he finally performed in a series of concerts in 1993 at the Casino de Paris and in two French famous festivals: 'Le Printemps de Bourges' and 'Les Francopholies' in La Rochelle. Then he took a two-year break before his new album "La mer n'existe pas" (still collaborating with Patrice Guirao). More at ease in live performances (which he admits is a personal therapy), Art Mengo recorded his first live album, "Live au Mandala", in 1997, and another studio album, "Croire qu'un jour ...", in 1998. Although his talent and some few hit songs, he has not really reached big public reputation yet. In 1999, famous singer Florent Pagny recorded a new version of Art Mengo's "Les Parfums de sa Vie " (on album "Récréations ").